1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an analog electronic timepiece which performs display by using hands and a hand drive control device.
2. Description of Related Art
There have been conventionally electronic timepieces which can perform various types of display according to the world clock function of displaying dates and times for various areas in the world, alarm notification function, stopwatch function, timer function, sensor measurement function and such like in addition to display of the current date and time. When the various types of display are performed by switching such functions in analog electronic timepieces which perform display by using hands, the analog electronic timepieces fast forward hands for moving the hands to respective corresponding initial positions and changing setting values or updating measurement values during display of the functions.
For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid Open Publication No. 2005-55449 which is a Japanese patent document discloses a technique capable of switching between a normal display mode and a power-saving mode for stopping hand movements in an electronic timepiece which includes a power generation section and a power supply section that has a capacitor for accumulating electric power supplied from the power generation section and supplies the electric power to other sections. In the technique, when the mode shifts to the power saving mode, display of a charging voltage of the capacitor is performed by fast forwarding based on a predetermined fast forward pulse. When the mode returns to the display mode, hands are fast forwarded to respective positions corresponding to the current time, thus allowing rapid return to the display of current time.
In addition, various techniques have been conventionally used in analog electronic timepieces for fast forwarding a hand to a desired position in the shortest possible time by adjusting a fast forward speed and a fast forward direction in consideration of the relationship between the number of steps of moving the hand for display and the rotation speed of a stepping motor rotating the hand.
However, there is a problem that simple fast forwarding of hands in the shortest time makes the fast forward operations uniform and does not expand the range of expression.